Social media mastery a key to Ted Cruz’s big win

Ted Cruz-Texas Candidate for U.S. Senate

On a geopolitical level, Ted Cruz’s victory in the Texas Senate runoff Tuesday reflected the power of anti-government populism among hard-core Republicans. But the most important lesson of Cruz’s landslide win over former frontrunner David Dewhurst has less to do with that political message than the rapidly evolving ways in which candidates communicate their message to voters.

The July 31 Republican runoff reflected a massive generation gap in the two candidates’ understanding of — and mastery of — social media and online networking.

The 41-year-old Cruz harnessed the power of social media and the internet to organize his campaign, communicate with supporters and get them to the polls, much like Barack Obama did in 2008. But Cruz pushed the boundaries of the 21st century communications phenomenon by reaching out to anti-establishment conservatives who then used their own networks to push his candidacy.

Experts say Cruz’s communications savvy played a major part in his emergence from obscurity and his ultimate triumph over the 66-year-old Dewhurst.

“The new reality in American politics is the social media and internet connections,” said Clemson University political scientist David Woodard. “They found Ted Cruz as their darling and pushed him hard.”

The proof is in the numbers. Cruz had twice as many Facebook fans as Dewhurst, 86,507 to 43,355. And he tweeted to his Twitter followers 5,117 times through runoff day, versus 597 for Dewhurst.

Dewhurst, the state’s lieutenant governor for a decade, relied far more on traditional campaign strategies such as extensive television advertising and endorsements by dozens of state legislators and Gov. Rick Perry.

“Cruz ran very much a modern campaign,” said University of Texas political scientist Sean Theriault. “Dewhurst’s campaign was one that could have worked six years ago, but the Obama team showed how important social media could be to a campaign.”

Cruz was conscious of the rapidly evolving social media model from the beginning of his campaign. He announced his candidacy during a call with conservative bloggers in January 2011, then tweeted the news before holding a traditional press conference. Cruz hired a 24-year-old social media trailblazer, GOP consultant Vincent Harris of Austin, who had helped mobilize conservative bloggers for 2008 presidential candidate Mike Huckabee. Harris created a “blogger action center” to work with conservative opinion leaders such as David Jennings of Big Jolly Politics in Houston (although he ended up supporting Dewhurst), and encouraged supportive bloggers to post pro-Cruz widgets on their web sites.

“Social media was critically important to Ted’s win,” Harris said. “There’s no doubt that the Cruz campaign ran the most integrated statewide digital strategy in the history of American politics.”

By election day, Cruz’s social media reach included national conservative political committees led by the Club for Growth and FreedomWorks, conservative bloggers and columnists such as Michelle Malkin and George Will, conservative and libertarian think tanks, conservative news outlets from the National Review to Fox TV, conservative talk-show and TV personalities including Sean Hannity, and well-known conservative politicians with national followings. Among them: 2008 vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint, Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, former House Majority Leader Dick Armey and 2012 presidential candidates Ron Paul and Rick Santorum.

Cruz’s allies helped him raise his visibility, raise money and raise his once-paltry poll numbers. Palin, who has almost 3.5 million Facebook “likes,” frequently posted about Cruz, often including photos from rallies and words of encouragement.

The Club for Growth PAC generated nearly $1 million in donations to Cruz’s campaign from its members. FreedomWorksforAmerica.org, a grassroots conservative group, allowed volunteers to download telephone lists so backers could create an instant phonebank for Cruz.

“They took that energy and they used it, and they channeled it through the internet,” said Victoria Defrancesco Soto, a fellow at the Lyndon B. Johnson School at the University of Texas.

The efforts paid off. Cruz received a massive quantity of favorable coverage in national conservative circles, while the small amount of attention devoted to Dewhurst was predominantly negative. Cruz also received thousands of small contributions from across the country, forcing Dewhurst to dig further into his own deep pockets.

UT’s Theriault said social media helped Cruz level the political playing field that had been tilted to Dewhurst because of his early financial advantages.

“Social media is relatively cheap compared to TV commercials and mail pieces,” he said. “Cruz faced an almost endless supply of money from Dewhurst. By engaging in social media to the extent he did, he was able to neutralize some of Dewhurst’s money.”

But Theriault said that innovative tactics alone would not have vaulted Cruz ahead of Dewhurst.

“Social media would have been pretty irrelevant if Cruz didn’t also have a message that resonated so perfectly with the mood of Republican voters in Texas,” he said. “It was his message that was crucial for the campaign. It would have been impossible for him to win if he had social media but not the right message.”